Monster
by Evandar
Summary: Oneshot. Naruto is haunted by a vengeful ghost. MadaraNaruto yaoi.


**Disclaimer:** I don't own _Naruto_ and I'm making no money from this story.

**AN:** This was written quite a while ago, but never posted. However, MadaNaru needs more love so I'm bringing it out.

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Monster

by Evandar

1. Naruto was awake, though he kept his eyes closed. There was someone in his apartment. He could hear them breathing. He kept still, trying not to draw their attention. The last time that the villagers had tried this, he'd been hurt.

Cold fingers brushed against the sliver of tanned skin that showed where his pyjama top had ridden up. Naruto twitched, but forced himself to stay still and fake his sleep, even as those fingers slid beneath the material to caress his stomach.

2. Naruto looked up as he passed the gates to the old Uchiha complex. He could remember, vaguely, it being a busy, bustling area of town. Now, not even Sasuke lived there. It had been left to the ghosts. He shuddered, thinking of the ghosts in his nightmares: cruelly beautiful men with red eyes and wild black hair. The ghosts of the Uchiha clan would be onryou, he thought.

3. For a moment, when he saw Sasuke with his Sharingan activated and his chakra making his hair fly around his face, Naruto thought he saw someone else.

4. The Valley of the End. All through his fight with Sasuke, Naruto knew that there was something wrong. He didn't know what, exactly, but it tugged on his consciousness. Then, as Sasuke's hand slammed through his chest and electricity shocked through his system, Naruto looked up, past his best friend, and met the cold gaze of a statue.

For a second, the cold he felt was centred on his stomach, on the Kyuubi seal.

5. Naruto knew that he shouldn't have woken up. His whole body ached and his mind felt fuzzy from the painkillers Tsunade had put him on. But wake up he did, and as soon as his eyes opened, he wished that he had kept them shut.

He was there: the man from the statue; from his nightmares. He was leaning against the wall by the window, staring at Naruto with eyes the colour of blood. His skin shone the colour of moonlight, and it wasn't until his lungs started to burn that Naruto realised he'd stopped breathing.

6. When the man kissed him, Naruto tasted blood on his cold lips. He thought of onryou, of vampires, and of shinigami. A cold hand pressed against the Kyuubi's seal, and the feel of it lingered hours after the man had vanished.

7. Jiraiya didn't say anything about Naruto's nightmares. He didn't say anything about the way Naruto avoided everything to do with ghosts, even going so far as to completely avoid kabuki theatres. But that didn't mean he didn't listen. He just didn't know what to do when Naruto clawed at his stomach screaming for something to get off.

8. After the third little run-in with Itachi and Kisame, Naruto discovered something about Sasuke's brother that he could actually like. For all that they shared similar features; Itachi looked nothing like the ghost who'd kissed him.

9. The Kyuubi was the one who gave him a name. Uchiha Madara. And when he'd spoken it, comparing Sasuke to that name's owner, Naruto had felt like screaming. How could Naruto want to save someone so like the man who haunted him?

10. It was months after his return to Konoha before Naruto felt brave enough to venture past the gates to the Uchiha complex. The buildings were worn and tumbledown, and there were scores in the wooden porches and beams that Naruto knew had come from kunai and shuriken. Even in the heat of a Fire Country summer, the Uchiha complex felt cold.

He didn't know where he was heading until he found it. A memorial stone, right at the centre of the Uchiha estate, dedicated to the family. There were empty offering bowls at the foot of it, but Naruto could almost smell the incense wafting up from them. He reached out and traced the names carved on the stone, not really seeing them, until his fingers brushed against one too familiar for him to pass by.

It was older than the rest; more weathered, but still the kanji of Uchiha Madara's name bit into Naruto's fingers until they bled.

11. Naruto dreamed of Madara so often that he couldn't really call them nightmares anymore. He was only scared of his dreams when he started to want the things Madara would do to him.

12. The Akatsuki fell one by one, but he remained out of reach. Naruto grew stronger using Sage chakra instead of the Kyuubi's, but in the end that strength was a curse. When he used his Sage chakra to search for Madara, he always came up empty.

13. "We'll get Sasuke back, right Naruto?"

Naruto nodded, but kept his mouth shut and his eyes trained on the road ahead. Sometime over the years he'd stopped running after Sasuke so much. He was running after Madara.

14. Sasuke was with Madara when they found him. He'd started to look more like Itachi, only with shorter hair and without the premature lines on his face. He glared when he saw Naruto, but Naruto looked past him – just like at the Valley of the End – and into the eyes of a real monster.

15. Madara still tasted of blood. Naruto could hear screaming behind him, the chirp of the chidori; he could smell fire and fear. He couldn't see. He'd closed his eyes as soon as Madara's chilly hands had gripped his face.

The Kyuubi's chakra was raging inside of him. He felt hot and cold at the same time. Frightened. The world was falling down around him, and all he could do was cling on to Madara for dear life. Someone he'd thought for years was some sort of evil spirit now seemed so alive in his arms.

He slid his hands up and twisted them in Madara's thick hair. He jerked. There was a crack, and Madara slumped like a puppet with its strings cut. Naruto drew away and stepped back. He let Madara fall. He pretended not to notice that his eyes had been closed too.


End file.
